Phenomenon
by Sugar Crash
Summary: HxD, canon up to the fifth book. AU onwards. Every so often, a phenomenon occurs. Time stops. The only people able to walk around are those feeling the most extreme emotion. Harry and Draco get into a fight at the exact wrong moment. T for the moment.


**Phenomenon.**

_Every so often, a phenomenon occurs. Not many people know about it, because not many people are conscience for it. In this phenomenon, time stops. Everyone but a select few people are frozen until those who can still walk reconcile their differences. So far, the only thing the people who are still conscience have in common is feeling an intense amount of emotion, no matter at who or at what. The emotion can be anger, love, hate, sadness, or grief, so long as it is an emotion that can consume a person wholly._

"Potter!"

Harry Potter, the Boy-Who-Lived, gritted his teeth and stopped walking at the sound of his name. His day had been nothing but accident after accident, and it didn't seem to be getting any better any time soon. Spinning on his heel to face his caller, he scowled. "_What_, Malfoy?"

Draco Malfoy, the insufferable Prince of Slytherin and an eternal thorn in Harry's side, sneered in the face of his rival. "Upset, are we? Weasleby finally up and dump you for that Mudblood girl, Granger?" Draco had always had a knack for knowing exactly what to say to push the other boy's buttons. He always knew when to not go too far and when to go in deep, how to really hurt the Savior of the Wizarding World. This time, however, he went over the line.

Dropping his bag, Harry fisted his hands in Draco's robes and lifted an inch or two off of the ground, spinning the two of them around to slam the other boy's back into the wall next to them. Draco, taken by surprise, could do little but drop his own bag in accident and grab a hold of his attacker's wrist. Face contorted into an expression Draco had never seen the other boy wear before, Harry hissed in his face, "_Leave me the hell alone, Malfoy_."

Opening his mouth to retort and further anger the boy, Draco scowled, but was cut off by the last two people he wanted to see.

"Harry!" Two identical cries made the Boy-Who-Lived come to his senses and begin to loosen his grip on the blond's robes. He swallowed, expression beginning to lapse into one of impatience and annoyance instead of pure, bottled up rage.

"Harry, he's not worth it, mate." Ron Weasley placed his hand as gently as he could on his best friend's shoulder, hoping to placate the other boy enough to keep him out of a fight. As much as he wanted to see Draco's smug face get beaten in, he had seen Snape a hallway or two down and if anyone was going to get Harry into even more trouble than he already was, it was him.

Joining her two friends was Hermione Granger, wrapping her hands around one of Harry's arms in an effort to get him to let the other boy go. "Really, Harry, you're in enough trouble today as it is. Let's just go to the Common Room," she hissed in his ear. The last thing Draco needed to know was how badly Harry's day had gone. He'd only use it to anger the boy more.

Letting Draco go as suddenly as he had picked him up, Harry took a step back and glared at the blond. "Just leave me alone for once, will you, Malfoy?"

Looking as composed as one who was just slammed into a wall can, Draco straightened his robes and smirked. "In trouble already, are we, Potter? Not having a good day?" His smirk became more and more smug as Harry's expression darkened. "There's a rumor going around that you blew up the Potions classroom. Nearly got Snape and that Longbottom menace killed, I heard." Again, that was the exact wrong thing to say.

Again, Draco's robes are fisted in Harry's hands, back up against the stone wall behind them. There's a slightly different look in his eyes this time, though...The normal emerald is a green too bright for him, almost as though he's holding back tears, but...That's absurd, and Draco's mind flashes to the Killing Curse, _Avada Kedavra_. Despite himself, he shudders. The hands keeping him pinned to the wall loosen and those green eyes begin to dim.

Ron and Hermione were midway into stopping Harry from hurting the Slytherin boy, but stop. Snape is coming around the corner, expression beginning to darken, but he stops midstep. The two teens take a second to look around and find that everyone, everything...

Has stopped.


End file.
